F87 Tuning

Ask a room full of M enthusiasts which modern M car BMW got *right*, and a surprising number land on the smallest one. The F87 M2 is compact, short-wheelbased, and tossable in a way the heavier M3 and M4 of its era never quite matched — passive dampers, honest steering, the kind of car that feels like it's reading your mind on a back road. It gets called the last of the purebreds, and the used market agrees: clean examples have stopped depreciating and started climbing.

There's a detail here that rewards knowing. The original 2016–2018 M2's engine is listed as an "N55," but BMW didn't hand it the ordinary one. This N55 got a forged crankshaft and rods, pistons lifted from the M3/M4's S55, cast-iron cylinder liners, and a reworked oil pan and pump to survive the lateral loads a car this eager pulls mid-corner. It makes 365 hp, and it's the version a lot of purists quietly prefer — lighter-feeling, simpler, and the one collectors are already circling.

In 2019 the M2 Competition swapped that engine for the full S55 twin-turbo from the M3/M4 — 405 hp, and 444 in the sendoff M2 CS. More power, more ceiling, and the same caveat that defines any S55 build: the crank hub (the full story lives on the F80 page; on the Competition and CS it's the same job, done before you chase real power). The N55 cars carry a gentler list — a plastic charge pipe that can split under boost and belongs in metal early, the familiar oil-filter-housing and valve-cover weeps, and a wastegate rattle that sounds worse than it is. Serviced and kept near stock, the N55 M2 is the easygoing one; it's heavy tuning and neglected histories that turn it.

So the F87 question isn't really "is it good" — it's *which one.* Want the purist's car and the appreciating asset? The N55 original. Want the bigger ceiling and don't mind doing the crank hub before you reach for it? The Competition or CS. Either way you're buying the M car a lot of people consider the high-water mark of the modern era — and one of the few worth more the longer you keep it.